


Chemical Angel

by chewblebee



Category: Eddsworld - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Hallucinations, Heavy Angst, I crammed it all in here and it's like a quick punch to the gut, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Medication, One Shot, Pain, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Unhappy Ending, lots of pain in a very short one shot like no joke, sorry :/ - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-22 23:59:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13177995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chewblebee/pseuds/chewblebee
Summary: You gotta understand my brain has got a mind of its own.Chemical angel, comfort I crave, comfort I crave, comfort I crave.





	Chemical Angel

**Author's Note:**

> This is a very quick one shot I did for fun after listening to Chemical Angel by Watsky, a song which I quickly associated with our favorite little communist after The End. If you all haven't listened to the song, or Watsky in general, I would highly recommend it! I'll put a link to it below!  
> https://youtu.be/dUaE3qpLWUs
> 
> (Also, I wrote this on the fly and for fun. My other fic, Totally Mental, is still on standby until further notice. Inspiration doesn't come easily folks, and I assure you I've been searching for it, but the ideas I had for finishing the fic have all up and left. Thank you all so much for your lovely comments, though, I've read each one and they all made me so happy! <3)

It’s a pain unlike any other to know who you are, but not know yourself. Once upon a time, you did. You remember. It feels like a dream. A bad drug trip, filled with haze and blue skies that you can’t even begin to reimagine. Now, all you see is red. The red of hot coals, of burning homes and branding irons that slash the way through hordes of freshly dried wood piles, leaving red fire in its wake like waves on a tormented sea. Maybe that’s all this is, a lone raft adrift in an ocean, praying for solace against the storms as lightning cracks above and brings color to all of the wicked things that lurk below. The tempest is ablaze with the ones left behind. The ones that were once trusted. Those who couldn’t stay above the waves. 

Swells ripped apart their oars and winds tore their sails until they had no other choice but to be left to the deep. But not him. Never him. He’ll tread until his last possible breath, and still he will fight the current. The flames lick at his arms, threatening to embrace him fully like the fallen that surround the plank of wood he clings to. He doesn’t tremble; no, he smirks. His sharp eyes stare up at the eye of the storm in competition. It’s only another challenge in the mind of the man, another hurdle on the track and he can already see the finish line. He will win. He always does. And they know that. They _knew_. Yet, here he is, kicking and cutting and slashing his way through, his teeth bared in a primal display of glee as blood, red, drips down his cheek and onto the shoulder of his winter coat. Life drains in his hands, and he watches the storm retreat into the heavens, leaving red rain in its wake that runs down his arm and covers his hands. A thud, and he smiles down at the heap that remains. The receding tide washing it all away like a dog with its tail between its legs. He knows who he is, but at what point did he forget himself?

⤧

One, two, three, four… five, six, seven… 

Check. Slide. Restart.

One, two, three, four… five, six, seven… 

Check… only six. There’s only six? _Could have sworn I’d counted seven…_

Seven. There. Seven days, counted out 53 times, all set aside in little containers. Stacked neatly in a medical briefcase alongside extra bandages, burn creams, and an inhaler. All necessary, right there at his disposal. The year is beginning soon, New Year’s Day quickly approaching as the effects of Christmas wear off and the little families in town pack up their trees and mistletoe. _“No more kisses now!”_ The mothers will joke to their children as they pretends to gag and run off to play with their newly-received attention grabbers and shiny distractions that they’ll forget about in one, two weeks. Then they will whine and cry in the toy store down the road because _“I didn’t get a RED one, Mummy! I wanted a RED one! I only got orange!”_ Whine whine whine, it’s no stretch to imagine why he didn’t have children of his own. He’d be a horrible father.

“How would you know if you never even gave it a second thought?” The sharp, impertinent tone cuts through his thoughts, stabbing through his shoulder. Pinpricks slither down his arm, sending shivers across the already damaged nerves. God, his head is already pounding.

“What in hell could you possibly mean by that?” He snaps back, refusing to even look in the direction of the voice and instead choosing to avert his attention to sliding the medical case off of the desk and pulling out the dust encrusted stack of paperwork that he’s been putting off for… hell, weeks now, much to the annoyance of Paul. “I never wanted kids. The little leeches are just walking headaches that take your money and ruin marriages.”

There’s a scoff from the other side of the room, “Oh, yeah? Your childhood must’ve been pleasant then, huh.”

“Shut up,” He waves a distracted hand in the direction of the two voices and shakes his head, “And kindly fuck off, I have work to do.”

“Work, eh? The same work that your second in command has been reminding you about for… oh, what was it Tom? How many weeks has it been?” He can practically hear the shit-eating grin in his voice.

“Hm… let me think. Was this paperwork before, or after he had that little breakdown?”

“The one where he threatened to shoot himself? Like it would do anything? Change something?” A higher voice pipes up from the farthest spot in the room from him.

A quick snap of fingers, “That’s the one. Four weeks then, and the stack only keeps growing.”

“Growing about as fast as the vines outside, hm? You’ve seen them, right? At the old house? It’s just rubble now, mind you. Those children down the block like to go there and spray paint the debris and smoke weed. Isn’t that a nice image? All of those memories lost to some cheeky teens who wouldn’t give two shits about damaging anything. Almost reminds me of someo-”

“I SAID SHUT UP!” He spins around, the dark, _empty_ room as cold and lifeless as every other time he’s been forced to look upon it. The shuddered rising and falling of his chest follows the clenching of his fist at his side. They always do that. He hasn’t seen them in years, but fuck if they don’t nag him just as they always did. It’s a process. A day of clarity, where maybe he’ll actually finish a stack of paperwork, maybe he’ll be social and roam around the base, chatting with the soldiers as they train and giving advice on stances or firing accuracy. The next he won’t be able to move from the roaring fire of agony that licks up his right side, the same days where he screams for Pat, or Paul, for _them._ Once, he overheard Paul talking, the man’s whispers reaching past the cracked door and down the hallway. He’d sighed and grumbled that these days were always the hardest to _deal with._ Pat had most likely agreed, but Tord had been far too busy focusing on the earlier phrase to hear it. _Deal with._ They have to deal with him, like a stray dog that showed up one day, broken and whimpering, and their little hearts just couldn’t bear to leave it out there all alone! What a poor, sad sight! They were such saints for taking it in! Give them a medal! Give them a kind smile _and pity the poor little shit they have to carry around on a fucking leash._

Then, in wake of the pain, is when the visions come. Hallucinations, brought on by the physical and mental trauma and his body’s reaction to the medication, or so the Red Army therapist had diagnosed. Some of the better days are easier and maybe he’ll only hear something in passing. A faint whisper or sentence that he’s entirely capably of ignoring, which was impossible to do when it first became a regular occurance. It certainly gave quite a fright to some of the foot soldiers when their leader, the strongest mind they’d ever known, began having arguments with the air and firing warning shots into the drywall. The looks were always the best part! The wide-eyed stares and open mouths, all of the stomachs twisting into knots before his own eyes, all dreading to know if they’d somehow done something wrong. He assumes that, after a week or two of it being a common display, Paul and Pat had held a base meeting and explained to everyone why it seemed like their commander had suddenly decided to take up ghost whispering. 

No one mentions anything, or mumbles about it under their breath, but at least he can still laugh at their expressions.

⤧

“Tord, have you ever wondered why you’re such a dumbass?”

“Every day, Thomas, I assure you.”

“Ohh, big bad Leader feels shitty about what he’s done for once? What a change!”

“Stop.”

“And why should I? Am I hurting your feelings or something, dick?”

“I said to STOP.”

“...Huh.”

“What? Can I _please_ have some quiet? These files are due tomorrow. Unless you want a third world war.”

“Nothing I just, I didn’t think you cared.”

“...Leave me alone.”

⤧

Screams evaporate into a louder silence, suffocating the air and choking him. He’s choking. He’s dying.

“About damn time, don’t you think?” A voice snickers from the corner, taking with it more of the air, sucking the gas right from his lungs for its own selfish use. _You don’t even need oxygen, you’re not real, you don’t need it._

“Sir, just breathe, okay?” A softer voice filters in from the muck around him, the clarity grounding him for what feels like only a millisecond before he’s gone again, “It’s another phantom pain, just ignore it. Look up, just look up at the stars. Can you count them?” He shakes his head in response, the entire room spinning and shrinking with the action, “Do you remember how many you counted last time?” How many was it? It was more than twenty, less than forty…

“Thirty-five.” He stutters out, his voice cracking from misuse. He’d screamed pretty loud earlier, from the speed that Pat had ran into the room. 

“Thirty-five, that’s pretty good! Let’s try to beat it this time, okay? Pick somewhere to start and count.” He motions up to the small window built into the roof, just large enough for him to see an array of stars. Space had always fascinated him, and believe it or not, he’d once wanted to be an Astronaut. That was before he realized all the shit he had to deal with down here. Then again, going with them almost counted, right?

“Wrong, you tried to kill me. A piranha in my helmet? Really? Prick.” 

“I didn’t mean it.” He whispers back, Pat’s eyebrows creasing in response.

“Red Leader? The stars, remember? Count them while I get your medicine ready, okay?”

“You have to count the stars to calm down?” A loud scoff, “What are you, five? Boo hoo, Mr. Big Bad Red Leader can’t stop hearing imaginary voices and feeling imaginary pain! Aw, let’s all baby the asshole because he sure does deserve it!” For the first time in years, Tord thinks he feels a breath on his temple, right where he heard the voice. He freezes, the wave never crashing, no breathing no blinking. Nothing can move, because if he moves, then that makes it real.

“You aren’t real.” He hisses, cursing himself for the fear that laces every syllable as they pass through his trembling lips.

“Red Leader? Count, please. You need to focus on something. I’m almost done.”

The breath moves to his ear, the cold air brushing the outside and sending shivers down his spine, “I’m as real as it comes, Sunshine Lollipops, and I think you know that. Feel this?” There’s suddenly a hand in front of his face, something he’s never seen before. _He’s never seen them_ , it’s only been voices from the dark corners of the room and faint whispers in the hallways. Never this. The hand comes down to cover his eyes and he can feel it. It’s cold and dark and suffocating and everything is too loud. Far, far too noisy. Millions of souls are shouting, chairs being scraped across the floor and boxes dropped and glasses shattered. “We’re all real, we always have been.” There’s something inhuman in that voice, something dark, even darker than the pitch black he sees before him.

“He passed out! This hasn’t happened before!”

“Should we call an ambulance?!”

“We can’t, unless you feel like breaking him out of jail again!”

“I-Is he breathing?!”

“So yeah, Commie, just lie back and count the stars. Count them like you always do. Count away until you can’t remember any more numbers and you fall asleep. That’s what we did, after all. All three of us. We slept and slept and slept,” There’s a sharp pain in his chest and, somewhere, he feels his body jolt, _“But now we’re awake again.”_

One, two, three, four… five, six…

_Could have sworn I counted seven._


End file.
